Today Fort Lauderdale zone met together and Mary took some pictures of companionships that I was not able to get on transfer day.

  

Sister Stegelmeier is training sister Herrera in the Davies area. Sister Pickup is being trained by sister Escorbores in the Hollywood Hills West area. Sister Lake is training sister Bean in Riverside Park.

  

Here are two pictures of elders Smoot and Bishop the zone leaders. Elder Smoot was born in the Fort Lauderdale zone and we had the opportunity to get to know him from then. It is good to have him back and serving with elder Bishop. The first picture is a little blurry – the second one is sharper but obviously elder Bishop did not expect Mary to snap the picture quite so soon. As mentioned below the couples in the mission – except for E/S McCormick got together Monday night. The Evans are in front with president and sister Anderson. In the back from left to right are the Bares,  DeGraffenreids, Sommerfeldts, us, the Collins, Boices and Barrys.

The second Monday in the month is the morning for our staff meeting. All the senior couples and president and sister Anderson have a meeting to discuss how all the different areas that are necessary to keep the mission running smoothly are doing. Finance, phones, referrals, cars, baptism and other records, mail, genealogy, employment, meetings, dinners, lunches, and housing are all need to be running smoothly so the above average missionaries can invite others to come unto Christ. Every mission has these needs and that is why senior couples are prized by every mission president.

I spoke to the financial secretary of the Jacksonville mission and not only does he take care of the finance and his wife is mission secretary, but they also are in charge of housing. I have no idea how they are able to do both of those callings. Elder and sister Collins keeps very busy fulfilling the need for housing, furniture and other items that every missionary needs.

But it is not all work as Senior missionaries. This evening we all got together – except the McCormicks who had important meetings down in the Keys – for our Christmas party. This is our second party and we had a wonderful night. First we feasted on a delicious ham dinner and then we exchanged White Elephant gifts.

  

Sisters Evans, Boice, and Sommerfeldt wait with elder Boice for the feast to begin. Ham, green beans, ‘see you later, ‘taters, green salad, rolls and strawberry short cake. No use counting calories around Christmas. While the food was wonderful, sitting around the table talking with the other missionaries is even better. The Boices and the DeGraffenreids sat warming themselves by the roaring fire – on the TV!

  

The best White Elephant gifts of the night – at least the ones that got the most laughs were Elder Bare’s ‘Woman on the Go’ essentials pack that no one wanted to take from him and a headlight that went from sister Collins, to elder DeGraffenreids to end up with sister Evans.

We ended the night going to a house not far from the chapel where Christmas fills a yard each year.